Strong, Fudd each shine as No. 1 UConn Women’s Hoops rout No. 11 Iowa in Women’s Champions Classic
Despite leading the UConn women’s basketball team with 21 points, Sarah Strong was not the headliner in the inaugural Women’s Champions Classic. That honor instead fell to Azzi Fudd, who scored 18 first-half points before exiting with a knee sprain.
Saturday afternoon in Brooklyn, however, both preseason All-Americans shared the spotlight. Fudd and Strong combined for 50 points as No. 1 UConn bested the No. 11 Iowa Hawkeyes 90-64 at the Barclays Center.
Strong took center stage first. The Preseason Big East Player of the Year missed three of her first four shot attempts. Once again, Strong shrugged off those struggles, making eight of her last nine without a turnover. Come halftime, the 6-foot-2 sophomore had nearly half of the team’s points and half of their 10 steals. While she only added a triple in the second half, Strong finished with 23 points, seven rebounds and six takeaways.
“It is like there is a halo over her,” head coach Geno Auriemma commented about the reigning National Freshman of the Year postgame. “There is an aura that she has where it never appears that she is in a rush to do anything.”
As Strong cooled down, Fudd heated up. The reigning Big East Player of the Week went from dropping six points in the first half to scoring a game-high 27 points. While Fudd shot below her season averages, her impressive second half yielded high praise.
“Azzi [Fudd] is a tremendous basketball player,” Iowa’s Hannah Stuelke acknowledged postgame. “She is really hard to guard for anybody.”
Blanca Quiñonez was just as challenging to defend against, partially because she became another Inspector Gadget for the Huskies. The three-time Big East Freshman of the Week, in 21 minutes, recorded 10 points on 4-5 shooting, four rebounds, five assists and four steals.
College basketball’s winningest coach highlighted that Quiñonez plays with “a real purpose.” His program’s latest Final Four Most Outstanding Player built on that statement.
“The way that she plays, you can tell that she has been playing pro basketball overseas,” Fudd expressed about the Ecuadorian native. “She is so talented offensively [and] defensively.”
Former Wisconsin Badger Serah Williams had what Auriemma considered “one of her better performances.” The Hawkeyes did what they could to limit Williams, who had seven points and four rebounds. Yet for all the work Jan Jensen’s frontcourt did, the senior forward still nailed down two contested jumpers.
KK Arnold and Allie Ziebell each joined the Brooklyn native with seven points. Arnold flirted with a double-double with six assists, while Ziebell put up her numbers in just nine minutes. Junior guard Ashlynn Shade rounded out the starters with five points.
UConn’s defense, despite allowing 60+ points for the first time in a month, was just as effective. The Huskies held Iowa to a season-low 25 field goals made and a season-high 26 turnovers. Connecticut, who also had 17 steals, turned those giveaways into 41 points.
The Hawkeyes shot better from the field than anyone has against UConn at 49%. A veteran forward and two sophomore guards provided Iowa’s offense. Stuelke, fresh off a 30-piece, flirted with a triple-double at 17 points, five rebounds and five assists.
Georgia Tech transfer Chit-Chat Wright picked up 16 and made half of her eight three-point tries. Taylor Stremlow nearly doubled her season average in points with 11. Ava Heiden, Iowa’s leading scorer, picked up just eight points with six rebounds to boot.
Williams started the scoring with a tough, contested bucket against Stuelke. Fudd followed with the Huskies’ next four, intercepting the Hawkeyes’ star forward’s pass for the latter of those field goals. Strong sank a three-pointer, and Shade grabbed Arnold’s miss to force an Iowa timeout.
The Preseason Big East Player of the Year’s first two-pointer sandwiched two Hawkeyes’ buckets. Arnold answered Wright’s three-pointer with one of her own, sparking a 9-0 Connecticut run. Iowa picked up the last four points to cut its deficit to 10 after one quarter.
Layla Hays and Taylor McCabe each scored three points to pull the Hawkeyes within six early in the second. Quiñonez’s three-point play put the Huskies up 13, but not even that could make the Huskies separate themselves. Iowa made three consecutive triples, and Stuelke sank a floater to make it a single-digit game. But UConn’s graduate guard gave her team an 11-point edge with a late layup before halftime.
The Huskies matched the number of field goals from long range they made in the first half in less than 150 seconds. Both Shade and Strong assisted on a three, then made one of their own in that stretch. Video review gave the ball back to Connecticut on the subsequent possession, which Williams turned into a layup.
Fudd had missed her first five three-point attempts. That all changed after the North Carolina native grabbed the offensive rebound. The class of 2021 No. 1 recruit converted her sixth shot from the perimeter, then scored the Huskies’ next five points.
UConn called its first timeout after Stremlow sank a three-pointer. Another three minutes passed before Fudd quelled the Hawkeyes’ comeback attempts with another three. Connecticut’s first Ecuadorian player and Kayleigh Heckel each added layups for a 21-point advantage.
The Huskies, specifically the 2021 Morgan Wooten High School Basketball Player of the Year, did not let up in the final frame. Fudd made five of her seven shots, three from behind the arc, for 13 points in just seven minutes. Iowa countered with Wright, who scored five of her eight points in the game’s final 90 seconds.
Kelis Fisher checked in for the 5-foot-11 guard with 2:56 remaining and scored a minute later. Ziebell tacked on the Huskies’ 13th three as they improved to 7-4 all-time versus the Hawkeyes.
Christmas break, as Auriemma hinted at after his postgame press conference, has arrived for the Huskies. Once it ends, UConn goes back on the road to take on the Butler Bulldogs at Hinkle Fieldhouse. Tip-off on Sunday, December 28, is at 4 p.m. on TNT and TruTV.
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